what i read

Archive for February 2008

The other day I was hanging out with James at the comic book store he works at, doing “research” for an article. Under a shelf of comics I notice several boxes of old books. One section is full of Jimmy Olsen comics from the 50’s and 60’s.
“How did Jimmy Olsen get his own series of books?” I ask James. “Superman was a really huge deal back then,” James says. “They gave all the supporting characters their own books to capitalize on the success. Jimmy, Lois, all of them.”
“Did Perry White ever have his own series?” I ask. “Because that I would read.” James laughs and tells me no, Perry White didn’t have his own series. “But I think there was a general Daily Bugle series that he was in a lot.”
“Daily Bugle?” I ask. “Isn’t that Spiderman, not Superman?”
“Ahhh!” James smiles at me. “Geek test!”

Readers, I have a confession:
This morning I blogged for someone else. It’s not something I’m proud of, and I was thinking of you guys the whole time, I swear.
But if you want to head over to UR Chicago (there’s a link posted to the left, as usual, or for those of you who won’t be reading this until weeks from now, click here for the direct link), you can read my little shpiel about why people should be more careful running along the lake. (Hint: If you’re not, you could die!)

Back in high school I became friends with Nik, and one of our first real “just her and I” things occured when I asked her to a dance at school. For whatever reason (I really can’t understand it now) the theme of the dance encouraged us to dress like famous couples (perhaps we were ripping off that Drew Barrymore movie where she goes back to high school undercover?), and for some reason Nik and I thought it would be a good idea to go as a couple that had just woken up and were still wearing their pajamas. Hilarious high school hijinx!
Well, here and now, many moons later, I’m still calling Nik up in desperation, asking her to be my +1 for things. On Saturday night I was invited to a party throw by the wonderful owners of Lovely: A Bake Shop, and Nik came along with me.
Below, enjoy photo proof of all of this, from high schoolers at a dance in pajamas, to respectable adults who have probably had too much to drink.

p.s. My hair in the high school pic is purposely trying to look like crazy bed head. Even if that were the “style” at the time, how could I have not known how ridiculous that looked. I mean, c’mon!

Things I was thinking about blogging on today, but ultimately decided not to:
– How I’ve added some new people to the Fellow Bloggers section on the left sidebar (it could be you!).
– A New York Times article in which pediatrician and author Dr. Karp asserts, “Toddlers are not just small people. In fact, for all practical purposes, they’re not even small Homo sapiens.” Is this man calling babies little monkeys? Or, even worse, some other type of little animal?
– A new book I started last night called Twinkies, Deconstructed.
– Why I should care about socialists, facists, or anarchist pigs. It still wouldn’t change the fact that I don’t have a car.

The other day I came across a picture of a trashcan from Seattle (featured left), with writing on it in English, Chinese, Vietnamese, and Spanish.
Confused, I emailed good ol’ Librarian Girl, who is not only a genius and knows all, but also happens to live in the fine city of Seattle.
LG wrote back:
“Yep, there is a really large Asian population here – in fact, the majority population here (besides white) is Asian, with that group being made up of mostly Chinese, Vietnamese, and Filipino, and that doesn’t count the people who don’t live here permanently but are here for business and tourism, which is a lot too. There are so many booming immigrant groups here though, and some groups may not have the most numbers right now but they are growing at faster rates- like Russian immigrants for example. So like at the library where I work, for instance, we have collections in four major areas besides English: Spanish, Vietnamese, Chinese, and Russian. We are also going to be expanding into Amharic, as we have a booming East African population too, although finding publishers in that language that distribute in the US is really hard.
That’s not to say that every public sign is in all of these languages– it depends where you are. Like, at the airport, all of the directional signs are pretty much in English, but when you get on the people-mover-train thingy, the stops and the “please hold the handrail” announcements are in English, Spanish, Chinese and Japanese.
It’s a big challenge for our graphic design department at our library, I know – how do you design something with a gajillion languages of text on it?
Wow, who knew I would go on and on about a picture of a trash can? I swear I can babble about anything.”
You learn something new every day.

This morning Kristine was asking me about the word appendix. “The organ or the addition to a paper?” I ask. “Addition to a paper,” she clarifies.
We talk about how appendix can also be a verb. “To appendix something,” I state. I then go off on a mini-rant about how almost anything can be turned into a verb. “Shoe. Sandwich. Green. They can all be turned into verbs.”
“That’s what I love about the English language,” Kristine says. “It’s very flexible.”
I nod in agreement and stretch my arms over my head. “The English language is like a woman who has been doing yoga for years.”

The other day I read a survey by internet ad outfit Mindset Media of 7,500 computer users, showing results that Mac users are generally more self-assured and less modest than PC users. They’re also more apt to be creative, perfectionist, and liberal in social mores and politics.
So basically it’s proving what I’ve known for years (but had no proof of): Mac users are just better.

Lately I can’t get the Chiquita Banana song out of my head.
I’ll be washing dishes…I’m a Chiquita Banana and I’ve come to say: Banana’s have to ripen in a certain way!
I’ll be in the shower and sing out loud…When they’re fleck’d with brown and have a golden hue, bananas taste the best and are the best for you!
While walking down the street I’ll hum…You can put them in a salad! You can put them in a pie – aye! aye!
In my elevator I’ll absentmindedly whisper…Any way you want to eat them, it’s impossible to beat them!
While be tying my shoes and blurt out…But bananas like the climate of the very, very tropical equator. So you should never put bananas in the refrigerator!
Maybe I need professional help.